Astronaut Buzz Aldrin on the lunar surface ... magnetic tapes recording surface conditions just after the first Moon landing have been discovered under the seats of Australian physics students.
Credit: NASA
They were nearly thrown out with the rubbish. But a last minute search instead has scientists in Western Australia dusting off several boxes of 'lost' NASA tapes which record surface conditions on the Moon just after Neil Armstrong stepped into space history on 21 July 1969.
After addressing Earth, the American astronaut set up a package of scientific instruments, including a dust detector designed by an Australian physicist. The data collected by the detector was sent back to ground stations on Earth and recorded on magnetic tapes - copies of which are as rare as the 'misplaced' original video footage of the 1969 touchdown.
Last week, up to 100 tapes, clearly marked "NASA Manned Space Center", turned up after a search in a dusty basement of a physics lecture hall at Curtin University of Technology in Perth, Western Australia. One of the old tapes has been sent to the American space agency to see whether it can be deciphered and 'stripped' of any important data which may have survived the ravages of time.
The data are a daily record of the environmental conditions and changes taking place at the lunar site after the Eagle landed safely in the Sea of Tranquility. The most important data were collected after the lunar module blasted off the surface later that day, leaving the still-running instrumentation behind.
The information showed that scientific instruments could be affected by setting them up around landing or take-off sites. They also proved that NASA did go to the Moon.
The data represented, "the only long-term information on the lunar surface environment, and as such are ideal for planning future lunar missions," according to NASA's website.
The "Early Apollo Scientific Experiment Package" (EASEP) deployed by Armstrong and Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin - a member of the Cosmos editorial advisory board - consisted of several self-contained experiments including temperature and seismic activity gauges and a small dust detector designed by Sydney-born physicist and environmental consultant Brian O'Brien, 72, who now lives in Perth.
The EASEP tool kit was the forerunner of other experimental instrument packages used on the Apollo missions. It was unplugged on 3 August 1969, having survived the harsh lunar conditions despite, in NASA's words, "operating temperatures which exceeded the planned maximum by 30 degrees Celsius". The EASEP instruments were activated again the following day, but by August 27, the experiment was terminated when it stopped responding to commands from Earth ground stations.
At the time, O'Brien believed lunar dust thrown up by the ascending NASA module would affect the instruments left on the Moon. He thought that lunar dust could settle on and ruin some of the experiments, which is, in fact, what happened.
Youe ignorance is disgusting
It sickens me that ignorant people like you denigrate the men who went to the moon and those who died in the effort. If you were more than just the bitter, hollow shell of a man, you would be ashamed.
hello i am a 13 year old
hello i am a 13 year old student, and i am amazed by space. just last year in school we learned about the whole solar system and that there might be an extra planet beyond pluto (the dwarf planet).i am so so so sooo excited that these tapes were found.
(hopefully i will get to watch some of them in school next year!!)
Lost Tapes
How in the name of God, can anything to do with the Greatest accomplishment of not ony the U.S.A. but man kind be lost or misplaced. Especially in a different country. I would of thought that anything so priceless and valuable of great achievment would be locked up in Fort Knox or somehere that no natural disaster could be a threat to their security.
When that was announced a few years ago, that only fueled the fire to the "hoax" theory, in my opinion. Most people were under the impression that it was the authenic footage of the 1st lunar landing. Was this mis-interpreted for other "mission information"??? If it was the original footage, it would lead one to believe that they were afraid of new digital re-mastering could uncover,,,a cover up. Anyways, glad they were found.
If man were to go to the moon in the future again, it would be nice if they could land in the Sea of Tranquility to prove the Footsteps and show the remains of the first mission to put this Hoax theory to rest.
Jim F.
Lost Tapes
Hey here's an idea. Why not point the Hubble Telescope at the moon and take some real close up photos of all that great stuff we left up there. That would probably convince me. So why not?
Lost tapes
Just to let you know. That was already brought up as part of the hoax. And has already been explained. Even with the hubble telescope they woudlnt be able to find anything smaller then a house.
And for all the people who say, "well why not go back and find the evidence of everything left behind?"
It might be kind of hard to find some trash and a flag on the moon. Its not exactly the size of your back yard.
the stupidity of some people is unbelievable
The conspiracy theorists make me laugh.
My father was involved in the mission to put men on the moon. Americans walked on the moon. Period.
Anyone who takes the conspiracy theorists seriously is, in simple scientific terminology, a "knucklehead". And probably also a member of the Flat Earth Society.
But by all means, keep the conspiracy talk going...it's really entertaining.
this proves maybe armstrong and others didnt go far into space.
simply not possible what you are talking about...
man kind getting direct exposure to the suns solar flares and radiation without an atmosphere would have their DNA shredded, and can not have children. that is why neil armstrong may never have actually been to far into space... yet alone the distance to the moon.
also- after not knowing why the rocket ship blew up in 1967, they supposedly designed and manufactured a totally new rocket ship and flew it 100% succesfully! this is akin to designing the first car- and having it travel 100'000's miles without even a test drive.
the theory behind getting to the moon is just theory! technology now will not get man to and back from the moon. so it surely didnt 40 years ago.
and the simplest fact of all is that digital cameras did not exist in 1969. any metallic film would not function in temperatures of 250 degrees and negative 250 degrees... so it is totally logical that photos of the landing were commisioned to be taken in a film studio. that is how up to 400,000 who worked on it were fooled.... they simply saw false footage like everyone else but believed it to be genuine.
Lost Moon Landing Tapes
Well what do you know? How in the hell did these tapes end up where they were found?? Dust detector? Now why would anyone need a dust detector on the moon? Buzz Aldrin is a member of the EDITORIAL on COSMOS!!Lol. Why am I not surprised at this? So, this proves that they did indeed go to the moon, does it? And guess what, the experiment was a failure!
Hello!!!
We landed on the moon.
1. The missions to the moon were all extrodinarliy dangerous, the astronauts were very lucky they wernt hit by a solar flare or anything. Also that mission was proposed today, with the level of technology that we had back then, NASA would say no and that it was to dangerous. SO you cant say that it was not dangerous.
2. The shutle brought back over 800 pounds of lunar rocks, which they sent all over the world to hundreds of different scientists. Even to cold war Russia, who would not have hidden the fact that the rocks were not genuine. Which they are, because they are distinctly different from lunar rocks which have a different compisition. Also only 100 pounds of lunar rocks have ever been collected across the entire earth.
3. Finally, we could get to the moon today, but we simply lack the motivation. The apollo 11 mission cost 24 billion american dollars, as well as the political motivation and a SCIENTIFICALLY LITERATE president (JFK compared to George Bush). While NASAs budget today is very lacking.
All the evidence points to man landing on the moon, and soon when we finally dispel this stupidity, you can all go hunt bigfoot or something.